


Wake Up, The Wicked Witch Is Dead

by nausicaa_lives



Category: Tin Man (2007)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 18:31:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19469710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nausicaa_lives/pseuds/nausicaa_lives
Summary: Wake up you sleepyhead,Rub your eyes, get out of bed,Wake up, the wicked witch is dead!Azkadellia sees the O.Z. through her own eyes for the first time in 17 years.





	Wake Up, The Wicked Witch Is Dead

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thesaltyavocado](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesaltyavocado/gifts).



They stay on the balcony for long minutes after the witch has melted, looking out over the O.Z. as the eclipse passes. Azkadellia knows that her mother, father, and sister are looking out over the horizon and seeing new dawn. But it's not dawn, it's late in the day, and sunlight is the same as it was moments before, and lights up a kingdom just as damaged, just as hurting as before. She sees the same thing she always saw, just without the witch’s voice telling her it's what she wants. She thought she wanted this of her own volition, she thought she needed this for _herself_ —but it wasn't her, was it. Azkadellia looks out over the barren hills and broken city and feels lost.

  
“The throne is yours again, my love,” her father says to her mother, disturbing Azkadellia’s focus on the scene in front of her.

  
“I know,” says her mother, “it’s been a long time. Restoring things to the way they were won’t be easy, but I have my daughters to help me, don’t I.”

  
“Of course,” says DG readily. Azkadellia doesn’t know what to say. She wants to focus on feeling the late afternoon winds around her, taking in the height of the balcony. She's aware of the world around her in a way she hasn't been since she was twelve years old. The sensations are almost too much, but they're better than trying to answer her mother right now. She doesn't know what will come next, but she doesn't see how the transition to a new O.Z. will happen the way her mother seems to be suggesting.

  
“Az,” her mother says at her silence, “if you don’t want to be involved, it’s okay.” But that isn’t it at all. Azkadellia has to say something, but right then one of her men bursts out onto the balcony. She's equal parts wrong-footed and relieved. She's afraid he'll be able to tell the difference, see right through her, see that the witch's power is gone, and at the same time this is something she knows. She's been there, this whole time, ordering around underlings and making things fall into place how she sees fit. The witch was there, but she was there too. 

  
“My queen,” he says, “I’m so sorry, the sun seeder’s pulse—”

  
“Be quiet,” she says, “and leave us now. Close the doors behind you and don’t let anyone come through until I say that I’m finished.” The bald man stands uncertain, looking at the returned sun, DG, and the previous queen incredulously. “Leave!” Azkadellia shouts, and he obeys. She turns around, faces her family again, and makes herself speak to them. It’s harder that commanding an army of thousands, and it takes a long moment for her to open her mouth.

  
“The people won’t understand. The kingdom has been a certain way for 11 years, and this after being torn by war for the six long years before it.”  
“And whose fault is that,” asks her father, steady but heavy laden with accusation.

  
“The witch’s!” Interjects her mother.

  
“Not hers,” follows DG. They’re both so alike, so good. So naive, she thinks, tries not to feel like the witch, tries not to be jealous.

  
“My Azkadellia, I know it wasn’t you, not really.” Her mother steps closer, lets her lavender eyes meet Azkadellia’s and rest there, like she’s trying to communicate that she’s comfortable in the contact. “You’ve been at war with a witch for such a long time, Az,” she says. “I can take back the kingdom and you can rest. And then, you and DG can rule it together.” The last sentence rankles, but Azkadellia pushes it aside—it’s not the point.

  
“Thank you, mother. Thank you for understanding. But the people won’t. They won’t just let me give power back to you. They remember the war, mother.”

  
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done to our family, to the realm, Azkadellia,” her mother entreats, and Azkadellia won’t go debase herself by reminding her mother that a moment ago she said it wasn’t her fault. “Do you have any idea the harm that’s been caused.”

  
Her father picked up where her mother left off, “creatures tortured, displaced, left to starve, the people left with no choice but to live under tyranny—”  
“I know!” Azkadellia said, louder and harder than she wanted to. “I know,” she repeated, quieter but just as hard. “But you need to see, I—” she won’t say she did the best she could, though it’s true. “Light magic was fading from the realm, I couldn’t help that, it was the witch’s doing, but systems were set in place. Laws, order. Our army is feared by everyone in the land, no one dares defect, no one dares cross us. Thievery is punishable by torture, so no one steals. It was wrong that the viewers were enslaved, but it let us see draughts, famine, before they happened, and do what we could to minimize damage. Without the responsibility of these things, common people have been free to simply live their lives.”

  
“I wouldn’t call them free, Az,” DG ventures.

  
“Neither would I, Deej. I’m just saying how it is now.”

  
“When your mother ruled,” says their father, and Azkadellia braces herself, because this she knows,“The kingdom was beautiful, bountiful and bright.”

  
“It was beautiful, I agree. But it was chaotic, too wild. I was able to overtake you when I was still a child, mother, only eighteen—”

“Because of the witch,” her mother interrupts, disturbed.

  
“Because you were weak,” she states, and she hates this, she hates having to do this, but she can’t just give in and do what’s easiest, what everyone else says is right, when she knows it won’t work. “And because of the witch,” she adds, because that’s true too.

  
“Even without the witch’s darkness casting a shadow on the kingdom, it will take time for DG breathe lightness back into every part of the realm.”

  
“You too,” adds DG, and Azkadellia is flattered, warmed, but knows she can’t do it like DG can, and that's not the point, anyway.

  
“If we take away the one constant that the people have grown used to and built their lives around, things will descend back into chaos. And with all the destruction and resource shortage, it won’t be the beautiful kind.” Her mother pauses, at last coming to terms with this.

  
“Then DG will rule with you.” Oh, how it stings. Azkadellia pushes forward.

  
“The realm is papered in wanted posters with DG’s face on them.” Her mother’s face hardens like it did all those times Azkadellia talked to her with the witch still inside her.

  
“Azkadellia, you can’t just—”

  
“She’s right,” DG interrupts. “We can’t upset the whole system just because we want things back the way they were, people will get hurt, we might lose power altogether.”

  
Her mother looks to DG, tilting her head and trying to ascertain something, while her father’s eyes are wide. Coming from the other side, he’s always taken it for granted that their mother was the rightful leader of the O.Z., that once the witch was stopped it was inevitable that their mother would rule again. Her rule in his eyes has always been a feature of nature, and the possibility that not everyone in the realm sees things the same way clearly jars him.

  
“Okay,” says her mother, and puts her hand on her father’s shoulder. “Ahamo. The girls have a point."

"DG?" Her father   
Azkadellia felt a bitterness rise up in her that she didn’t want but couldn’t help. It didn’t matter what she said to her parents, it only mattered that DG agreed.  
She couldn’t blame this feeling on the witch. The witch was gone, an absence she felt keenly, like an injured limb that had finally been amputated. Her body was no longer in conflict, could start to heal, but a part of her was missing. She had to push away the impulse the throw her chest out and let the realm feel her anguish at her parents’ deference to her little sister. It aggravated an old wound from before the witch, before Finaqua. Her winged monkeys were no longer there, anyway, had left when the witch had. I’ll never leave you, she hears the familiar voice in her head, and though she knows it was her choice to cast the witch out, it still feels like a betrayal. She thought she had someone who would stay forever, and now, even with her family around her, she feels so alone. It had felt like things had been okay earlier, when she’d reached out and held DG’s hand in hers and felt DG stay, knew that DG wouldn’t let go. Now their hands rest at their sides, and Azkadellia feels clammy, unsteady. She wants DG to grab her hand and hold it again, make her feel safe and brilliant with their shared light, make her feel like the right kind of conduit after so many years of holding the witch inside of her. But Azkadellia was always the older sister, always had to reach out first, while DG would happily go off by herself, explore, find meaning apart from their sisterhood. Azkadellia imagines that if she hadn’t taken DG’s hand in the forest, DG would have flattered the bear with her own magic, conjured it fresh fruits and ridden off on its back, leaving Azkadellia behind her.

She shook her head to bring the present moment back into focus. Her parents loooked at her expectantly, swayed, for the time being, by DG’s support. Azkadellia found it in herself to meet DG’s eyes, let her own narrow in a smile that didn’t quite reach her mouth. DG smiled easily back at her, and it was enough, in that moment. Her parents looked on and Azkadellia could tell they were reveling in DG’s kind spirit, DG’s obvious forgiveness and openness. Azkadellia couldn’t blame them, either. She had done unspeakable things, and had to accept that things would probably be like this for a long time.


End file.
